Spiffster

I think that guy (Wayne Gerdes) drove the regular Hyundai Sonata if I remember correctly. I thought the HSH was a nice car inside and out other than the hideous wheels. It road nice too but IMHO didnt outshine the FFH in any area, though the salesman insisted it was a superior car to the FFH. The obvious advantage was the standard warranty 10/100,000 miles but nothing an ESP couldn't cure. Currently they are asking 10% over MSRP which is just a joke on top of the other BS like the 599.00 clear bra and the 499.00 stain guard crap. As I had mentioned before, I got my FFH for less out the door fully loaded than they were asking for a base HSH out the door.

Already checked one out. The city rating of 35mpg killed the deal for me as just about all of my driving is done in the city. Going from 41 to 35 is almost 20% hit. I also didnt like the fact that there was no "engage" like interface which allows me to ride in EV mode as long as possible, and is just fun to use. Didnt help the sales person was bit of a snob either... not sure what was up with that.

OK so the Insurance company has declared the car a total loss. They are to cutting us a check for VERY close to NADA value plus taxes and allowing us to hold onto the rental for another week. Id say, other than waiting almost 2 weeks to get a definitive answer, we are more than satisfied with the outcome (considering we still would rather this not have happened at all!). Unfortunately, it may be difficult to get into another FFH for the same price we got our original one for. Luckily I have another method of efficient transportation (motorcycle) and the weather is getting nicer so we can wait and hold out for the right deal. Huge thanks for everyone's feedback here, it was very helpful!

I am not saying I would expect them to give me more than 29k, I would be happy to get that much. But like I said we are still gonna have to throw at least 4k more in to get a new one. We are still getting screwed since we were just fine with the car before this happened and had planned to keep the car for at least 10 years. If they chose to repair the car, well that is simply unacceptable... Yes they have provided us with a rental.

NADA in my area comes in at $29,000 for a loaded FFH. That's about 1k less than I bought it for minus taxes... That sounds great but if I buy a new one for what we got our last one for we are still out 4k...

Thanks Warrior 6. I cant find a single fully loaded, used FFH for sale here let alone a silver one. The dealer we bought ours from is sold out of the FFH. I hear other dealers are selling them for full MSRP or MORE. We bought ours at almost 3k below MSRP a year and a half ago but now I think we are SOL. Kinda pissed our insurance company is taking so long to give us an answer, but what can we do... amazing how well this car holds it's value isnt it!

Very likely, my wife and I took a look at the Hyundai Sonata Hybrid and while the car is very nice looking (besides the extremely ugly wheels) I didnt like it as much as the Fusion overall, and 90% of our driving is in the city so the Fusion makes much more sense to us. Currently they are trying to sell the BASE HSH for the same price I can get a fully loaded FFH for. They even had the audacity to tell me the HSH is in "every way" a superior car to the FFH... hilarious... I say "Very likely" because we may wait until a price is announced for the Ford Focus electric before we buy another FFH.

Thanks for the info on the ESP, that is awesome! The claim process was started last Tuesday 5/10 and I was told that the adjuster looked at the car the next day so who knows what the hold up is... Oh, and to answer this question: "Did they find out who is responsible for the fire? Too bad if they didn't. Then the insurance company could go after them for their losses and maybe they'd be kind to you." As far as I know they have no idea who started the fire. I imagine it was one of the people that were parked there though, probably got out of the car and threw the cigarette into the mulch... the firefighters assumed that is what started the fire (what they told me) but they had a fire investigator that was supposed to determine exactly what happened. I have not heard anything else... and no I dont smoke, if i did i would like to think i would have enough brains not to throw a lit cigarette just anywhere.

Thanks for the feedback everyone. I do appreciate it. This is the information I was looking for to help with the claim. When I first saw the damage I thought there was no way the insurance company would not total the car out. All I thought I had to worry about was whether or not I would get the full book value. I talked to my buddy that owns a body shop and he said the car should ABSOLUTELY be totaled. Now, being more than a week later I am kinda wondering what is taking the adjuster so long to get back to me, it really has me worried as I thought it was going to be a fairly cut and dry case. If they do chose to repair the car I am certainly going to "raise holy hell". Another concern is that I had purchased an extended warranty from Ford, and Im sure I wont get that money back from the insurance company, but I am wondering if Ford will allow me to transfer that warranty to another new Fusion considering that the factory warranty was still far from expired.

This is exactly what I am worried about. The engine bay was not damaged as far as i know. As rfruth had mentioned, the car will never be the same, period. The insurance company will go the least expensive route, cant blame them. Most people just want to get back on the road but never think about the long term repercussions of owning a vehicle that has FIRE DAMAGE on its title. I am not one of those people... if they want to repair the car, that's fine with me as long as they cut me a check to account for the massive depreciation in resale value. That would be the only way to get me (sort of) back to where I was before my car got roasted. That or just total the car so I can buy another one without fire damage on the title... which right now is near impossible, new or used. BTW I have a sense of humor, I just wasnt all that thrilled to find "That'll buff out." as the first response to my post... Didnt really help me much, but I can see the humor in it.

Yes, the back window blew out from the heat / pressure inside the car. Some cars got it a lot worse but NO gas tanks exploded... Doubt Ford would have any interest in a burnt car but hell, if they send me a replacement they can have it . I have no desire to be on the front of a magazine, just dont want my insurance company to screw me over.

OK, so last week my FFH got roasted along with 5 other vehicles in a fire started when someone threw their cigarette into some mulch next to where my car was parked. Take a look at the attached picture. My insurance company is still working on the claim a week later because they still need to determine whether its a total loss or not. Like anyone in this situation I dont want to get screwed, and certainly DONT want this car back. It really sucks because we babied this car, and had absolutely no problems with it, loved it. The car was a year and 3 months old and had just over 15k miles on it, it was in PERFECT condition. Fully loaded, NADA says its worth 29,225 (clean retail) w/ 15k miles. I can only assume that the batteries are completely toasted... at the very least they have been subjected to extreme heat. I need to arm myself with as much information as possible so I can be prepared if the insurance company decides the car is fixable / assumes I am a sucker. So any advice / experience is appreciated. Thanks!

I see what you are saying and I agree mostly but there should have been a cap on the Colorado tax credit for EVs. 40k is insane... 850 that is correct, not sure where I got 750 from, the information is not very fresh in my mind. Thanks for the responses guys.

Thanks for the quick reply. In my case things are really simple, the order date was the delivery date. Just walked into the dealership, laughed when the sales person told me it would get the full credit, and purchased the car anyway knowing that I should get the 750 credit. Took delivery that same day. From my research in this forum, it looks like many used turbo tax. I cant believe that I made a typo, I attempted to fill out the credit at least 5 times to my disbelief that I was not eligible. Also, what's this I read about deducting the sales tax? I saw no such form in turbo tax... Im going to see an actual professional to do my taxes this year... Already got screwed out of the 8k new home buyer credit, I am not losing this one!

I was doing my taxes LAST YEAR using Turbo Tax Online and could not get the system to accept my 750 dollar tax credit for the FFH that I took delivery of on the 9th of December 2009. Wasnt sure why it kept giving me an error on that portion of the program. Kept saying that I was not eligible for that particular tax credit. At the time I assumed that I had missed the cutoff so I just went about my business and completed filing. After further research I am positive that I was indeed supposed to get this credit. I understand that I can apply to receive this credit for this tax season, is that correct? Also, I am finding a lot of conflicting information for tax credits on Hybrids in Colorado. Some sites say Colorado has a tax credit for "HEVs, PHEVs and EVs" while others say "PHEVs and EVs". Why the hell would they give a 40k tax credit to a Tesla owner and 0 to a middle class (more like lower middle class) Fusion Hybrid owner... wtf? Anyone have any more information on this? Thanks!